ABSTRACT
AS it was faid of Brutus and Cassius, that they were the laft of the Romans; so it may be faid of Mr. Betterton, that he was the laft of our Tragedians. There being, therefore, so much due to his Memory from all Lovers of the Stage; I could not lay afide my Design of conveying his Name with this Discourse at leaft to a little longer Date, than Nature has given his Body. Nor can I imagine, that it can be look’d on, as injurious to our Reputation, either as Men of Candour, 2Figure or Sense, to exprefs a Concern for the Loss of a Man so excellent in an Art which is now expiring, and for which Antiquity had so peculiar a Value; since it is plain from the Motto of this Book, that Cicero pleading the Cause of the Poet Archias, tells the Judge, a Man of the first Quality, that every Body was concern’d for the Death of Rofcius the Comedian; or which is more emphatic, says he, Who of us was of so brutish and four a Temper as not to be mov’d at the late Death of Roscius? Who, though he dy’d old, yet for the Excellence of his Art, and Beauty in Performance, seem’d as if he ought to have been exempted entirely from Death.
